Art on show -- everywhere

A bus drives along a street in central London on December 16, 2011. There's a screaming head by Francis Bacon at the bus stop, and a landscape by John Constable in a shopping centre -- just some of the art forming part of a novel exhibition in Britain.
(AFP/File)

LONDON (AFP) – There's a screaming head by Francis Bacon at the bus stop, and a landscape by John Constable in a shopping centre -- just some of the art forming part of a novel exhibition in Britain.

In what organisers say is the world's largest exibition of art, 57 British masterpieces have been reproduced across 22,000 posters on buses, taxis and advertising billboards everywhere from car parks to the London Underground.

The works included in the "Art Everywhere" project, which runs until August 25 across the country, were chosen by members of the public in an online vote.

Top of the list were John William Waterhouse's "Lady of Shalott" and John Everett Millais' "Ophelia" -- both doomed women who met a watery grave.

Other pictures on display include modern artists such as David Hockney, Tracey Emin and Damien Hirst, as well as a picture of Cornelia Parker's "Cold Dark Matter", which involved blowing up and then re-assembling a garden shed.

The project was financed by private donations, while the poster industry donated ??3 million (3.5 million euros, $4.6 million) worth of advertising space.